Inside the Fund Behind MrBeast, Kai Cenat, & TikTok’s Top Creators

Ben Matthews is a general partner at Night Ventures, an early-stage consumer VC fund, focused on culture, community, and creators. They have partnered with some of the most famous people on the internet including Mr. Beast, Kai Cenat, Hasan Piker and many more.

In this episode of DTC Pod, Ben joins Blaine to discuss:

➤ Lessons from incubating and investing in early-stage consumer companies

➤ The key elements of successful talent-driven brands, including audience fit and long-term commitment

➤ Choosing the right business opportunities based on market potential and operational feasibility

➤ Structuring effective partnerships between creators, operators, and investors

➤ The future of TikTok and emerging monetization avenues for content creators

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Fav Quotes from Episode #350

Influencer Content and Buying Behavior: “When you build a business like SKIMS, I think it was a beautiful execution. Not only in the actual product, but really picking somebody who had an authentic story around shapewear and who had an audience that was used to taking that call to action. And that was a huge challenge, even with Feastables in the beginning. Feastables doesn't have an audience that's used to doing things that Jimmy asked them to do during his videos. That took training, that took certain types of content, certain types of advertising, changing the call to action and changing the way that we did promotion. Ultimately getting a customer [to] a point where they just thought about Feastables and Mr. Beast as one entity, and he was speaking about it enough that that really kind of broke through the chasm of where you need to get to, to really have an impact on having someone's change in their buying behavior.” — Ben Matthews, 00:13:57 - 00:14:48

Power of Content Creation: “If you're a content creator today, if you're somebody that makes their living doing that, there's more than one way, more than just adsense in order to bank on for monetization, there's going to be a lot more ways for you to monetize your catalog in the future. And continuing with that trade is like the absolute best thing that you should do. Because having an audience is absolute power." — Ben Matthews, 00:43:33 - 00:43:47

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3 Best DTC Practices from Ben Matthews

1. Pick the right talent for the right audience

Looking to harness the power of influencer marketing? The key is finding the perfect partner.

As Ben points out, it's not just about follower count. You need to dig deeper and truly understand a creator's audience before teaming up.

Here's how to pick a winner:

➤ Assess their "shill" skills: The Rock clearly has some shill skills if he can sell shampoo without having any hair himself! This is the byproduct of the trust he’s been able to build with his audience over decades of selling successful DTC products. It’s also true that The Rock can sell anything!

➤ Gauge their long-term commitment: Will they prioritize your brand partnership as their career evolves?

➤ Understand audience alignment: Does their audience match your ICP and have a track record of taking action based on the creator's recommendations?

Once you've found the right fit, it's all about wielding that influence strategically.

Educate the audience on your brand story and product benefits through the creator's unique voice and content style. You want their community to inherently associate your offering with the talent they know and love.

This could look like:

➤ Ongoing product plugs seamlessly woven into the creator's regular content cadence

➤ Custom co-branded content and campaigns that bring your brand ethos to life

➤ Collabs scheduled around key launches and promotions to drive timely demand and action

Consistently reinforce your brand-creator connection across touchpoints to keep building that crucial affinity and trust with your target audience over time.

2. Choose the right product and build a moat

Picking the right thing to sell is make or break for DTC success. But it's not just about chasing trends or hopping on the latest viral sensation.

As Ben shares, you need to zero in on markets with major growth runway—at least $100M in annual revenue potential—and the ability to claim it profitably with healthy margins.

Easier said than done, right? Here's how to hone in on a hero product:

➤ Identify unmet consumer needs or emerging trends with serious commercial legs

➤ Prioritize innovative product ideas you can produce affordably and that aren't easily replicated

➤ Consider operational costs and complexity, avoiding fussy supply chains unless you've got the chops

➤ Crowdsource ideas from talent or influencers already tapped into your target demo's desires

Above all, choose something you can realistically build a business moat around. Think ownable brand positioning, a unique hook or selling point that sets you apart from the pack.

Put in the upfront market analysis and creative brainstorming to land on something truly remarkable. A product with the power to convert customers and keep them coming back for the long haul.

3. Maximize your content's value for the future

Sure, pumping out social content is the DTC du jour. But if you really want to win big, you've got to think beyond the likes and views.

As Ben explains, creator content is a goldmine waiting to be tapped. There's huge potential to repurpose all that "dark data" your content generates to power new biz opportunities down the line.

We're talking training large language AI models, fine-tuning recommendation algorithms, even informing future product development. It's all insanely valuable to big tech and could equal big bucks for savvy creators and brands.

So how do you start extracting that extra value from your content machine?

First, get organized. Implement a process and system for cataloging and tagging content as you go. Make it easily searchable and accessible to mine later on.

Resist the temptation to create purely trend-chasing, disposable content. Focus on quality over quantity. Craft a healthy mix of timely and evergreen pieces with lasting relevance and reusable elements.

Stay on top of emerging tech and companies commercializing this type of data. Build relationships proactively so you're poised to pounce on monetization opps as they arise.

Don't sleep on your content's long-tail potential. Build it with the future in mind and you could be sitting on a revenue stream you never even dreamed of.